Tying The Silver Surfer 02Nov18

Sometimes bright flies save the day - for me this is especially true when a river has poor visibility and is turbid for whatever reason: rain, lake effluent seasonal turnover, construction upstream or other; if I am not catching anything with "normal" flies I may go to silver, pearl or opal like the Rainbow Warrior or the Silver Surfer. This fly is intended to be a fall quasi-baetis and therefore I do tie it smallish (#20-#22). I tie them with and without a cobalt glass beadhead and find both effective. I also really like a bit of blue in my flies so the wire and head here are bright blue - especially in low viz, this works for me. Here we go...

DRC's Cobalt Silver Surfer Fall BWO

Recipe/Ingredients:

• Hook: #22-#20 TMC 2487
• Thread: Dark gray (blue dun) #70 UTC UltraThread
• Head: Optional cobalt glass bead
• Tail: ~8 gray soft hackle fibers
• Body: Silver 3D mylar (size M) with blue wire (size S) overwrap
• Thorax: Silver ice dub
• Legs: Gray soft hackle feather

Add cobalt glass bead and set in vise.

Bind on thread; tie in tail fibers (adjust to allow
fibers at shank length from bend point). Bind on
wire and wrap to bend. Tie in mylar at bend then
trim tag of tail fibers and wrap thread forward
covering all bindings smoothly.

Wrap mylar forward and bind in.
Overwrap blue wire ~6X, bind in and helicopter
tag off.

Spin on silver ice dubbing and wrap on a thorax
about the size of the bead (but leave a bit of
space between bead and thorax for legs.

Select small gray hackle feather with base fibers
about equal to shank length. Strip "duffy" fibers
from base of feather and bind onto the fly (2 wraps
over stem and then pull base stem back and tie once
in front. Trim off stem.

Wrap legs feather 2-3 times in the gap then
bind in. Wet fingers and pull back legs to
whip finish and trim.
[this fly has a tail and legs that are a bit too big]